Spear Combos make me die

I know these interactions of triggering cool combos sound fun and engaging on paper. But ultimately, I find myself overthinking how and where to combo — and it’s not a second-to-second decision of which skill to use in what order. It feels more like a hectic noob trap that results in tons of unnecessary damage taken while trying to figure out what state I’m in and what state the enemy is in, just to combo the right skill at the right time.

The lack of transparent information and the limited time to make those decisions is something I personally can’t handle — and it doesn’t create fun, only frustration. I basically painted the devil on the wall while thinking about this, and then subsequently died in a horde of enemies because I didn’t make the split-second decision to just drop an AOE. Instead, I was frantically looking for a weakened enemy to cull and trying to chain effects for a bigger explosion.

So I died, quit the game, wrote this post — and now I’m going to play Anno 1800.

P.S. How to solve this issue for me? Just don’t play combo skills.
Are there skills that are non-combo, fun, and effective? Very few.
I think a more traditional, non-state-based combo system would be more enjoyable, as it doesn’t require constant game-state observation in this rather hectic game. But that might just invite macros.
Maybe split combos by end result:
One combo path into an AOE, one into a multi-hit, one into a single-target finisher — making the decision about what kind of combo you're building toward more meaningful and intuitive.
But this current state-based combo system?
From my point of view, it just sucks dog shit.

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Imp0815#7644 написал:

One combo path into an AOE, one into a multi-hit, one into a single-target finisher — making the decision about what kind of combo you're building toward more meaningful and intuitive.

You cast abilities depending on your needs at the current time in a multiple threat scenario, its not like you're always have a 1v1 in Tekken.

Then there's certain skills with huge bonuses depending on what you've done or are just simply set in motion by hitting enemies, the very helpful streamer Raxx made a very simple to follow whirlwind creating guide for spears.

If you want to die less to create more thinking time this game has plenty of ways to debuff the enemy into a stunned state (freeze/stun/electrocute) and freeze is easily accessible in the early game...and then there's focusing heavily onto either armor/energy shield/evasion and actually utilizing the many passives, including Spirit skills which sometimes amplify defense incredibly.

I really don't know what else to say but perhaps the difficulty of playing/theory crafting on Huntress isn't for you and Monk's early game is straight forward in comparison, just use Frozen locus, leap back, chills enemies and the crystal explodes for easy freezing.
You could even equip a Quarterstaff as a secondary weapon on Huntress and use their Freezing skills, the ball is really in your court to play.

The issue with combos in a game like this is they get monotonous real quick because this is a ARPG grinding game not a black desert online souls like. BDO works because it is 3rd person and reactive, you can see the enemies well enough to react.

This direction for POE 2 doesn't even make sense, Too much going on the screen with on death effects, homing on death effects, giant AoE "floor is lava" on death effects, bum rushing enemies by the screen full, off screen projectiles.....

Combo what? Wtf are you supposed to build up to? Most of the time attempting these combos is what gets you killed. Your character animation takes so long you are dead half way though the attack animation.

You cannot simultaneously do all this combo shit and pay attention to 50 enemies, plus off screen projectiles, lava floors and a bunch of other bs.

GGG or whoever, is trying to mix two mechanics that were designed for totally different game genres. 3rd person games can do this, first person games can also add these type of mechanics at will.

An isometric game designed from the ground up maybe be able to integrate "souls like" mechanics but you cannot take an existing IP and engine and force mechanics that the engine simply wasn't designed to implement. This would be an uphill battle if the game was designed from scratch, I don't see the DEVs at GGG being able to "wing it" there are too many mechanical conflicts preventing this type of gameplay.

POE and POE 2 are literally the same engine with updated graphics. That's it, cut and paste enemies etc. To implement these changes the engine and monsters need completely redesigning and tested individually as well as remedy all possible conflict interactions of which there are probably millions.

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Soulscar1#4896 написал:

An isometric game designed from the ground up maybe be able to integrate "souls like" mechanics but you cannot take an existing IP and engine and force mechanics that the engine simply wasn't designed to implement. This would be an uphill battle if the game was designed from scratch, I don't see the DEVs at GGG being able to "wing it" there are too many mechanical conflicts preventing this type of gameplay.

POE and POE 2 are literally the same engine with updated graphics. That's it, cut and paste enemies etc. To implement these changes the engine and monsters need completely redesigning and tested individually as well as remedy all possible conflict interactions of which there are probably millions.

I'm struggling to digest this train of thought/exaggeration.

Dark Souls even has invincibility frames on dodge roll so are they cutting corners in design? The Dark Souls "genre" (a word for style/theme of a game, not intended to be the definitive gospel of needed mechanics) isn't rocket science, enemies are simply designed to have a number of hard hitting moves that don't happen instantly so the player can read them and adapt accordingly alongside the own players skill pool which may or may not have attack wind up times so that attacking needs to be calculated and in turn the player is rewarded via the satisfaction of skillfully applying themselves.

When seasoned players are referring to Dark Souls, they're simply meaning the game requires some mechanical forte in offense and defense and that enemies pose a certain degree of care as some of their attacks are intended to be dodged/parried.

POE2 simply works and the evidence is as clear as the trial of ascendance which works, you can avoid everything if you choose to and apply yourself at the correct timings.

You can carry on with genre gatekeeping but let me just say...League of Legends is still the king of esports, its isometric and there's a ton of different skills and abilities spread over 150+ champs, all made and balanced from a game engine that started around when POE1 got released.

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TrunktenUK#3407 написал:

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Soulscar1#4896 написал:

An isometric game designed from the ground up maybe be able to integrate "souls like" mechanics but you cannot take an existing IP and engine and force mechanics that the engine simply wasn't designed to implement. This would be an uphill battle if the game was designed from scratch, I don't see the DEVs at GGG being able to "wing it" there are too many mechanical conflicts preventing this type of gameplay.

POE and POE 2 are literally the same engine with updated graphics. That's it, cut and paste enemies etc. To implement these changes the engine and monsters need completely redesigning and tested individually as well as remedy all possible conflict interactions of which there are probably millions.

I'm struggling to digest this train of thought/exaggeration.

Dark Souls even has invincibility frames on dodge roll so are they cutting corners in design? The Dark Souls "genre" (a word for style/theme of a game, not intended to be the definitive gospel of needed mechanics) isn't rocket science, enemies are simply designed to have a number of hard hitting moves that don't happen instantly so the player can read them and adapt accordingly alongside the own players skill pool which may or may not have attack wind up times so that attacking needs to be calculated and in turn the player is rewarded via the satisfaction of skillfully applying themselves.

When seasoned players are referring to Dark Souls, they're simply meaning the game requires some mechanical forte in offense and defense and that enemies pose a certain degree of care as some of their attacks are intended to be dodged/parried.

POE2 simply works and the evidence is as clear as the trial of ascendance which works, you can avoid everything if you choose to and apply yourself at the correct timings.

You can carry on with genre gatekeeping but let me just say...League of Legends is still the king of esports, its isometric and there's a ton of different skills and abilities spread over 150+ champs, all made and balanced from a game engine that started around when POE1 got released.

I wasn't talking to you but thanks for the condescending strawman reply. Not interested.

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Soulscar1#4896 написал:

I wasn't talking to you but thanks for the condescending strawman reply. Not interested.

Who's being condescending? I certainly didn't brutally damn the hard work of game designers.

Just remember this is a forum, not reddit.

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TrunktenUK#3407 написал:

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Soulscar1#4896 написал:

I wasn't talking to you but thanks for the condescending strawman reply. Not interested.

Ah ok sure.

Just remember this is a forum, not reddit.

Yeah never been on reddit in my life. Don't offer insults and play the victim.